June 22, 2016, 10:20:10 AM

Posted on Pharyngula:

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One of our writers, Richard Carrier, has been banned from Skepticon for "his repeated boundary-pushing behavior". This is, obviously, a serious accusation, and we've been investigating further. We now have several first-hand reports of persistent, obnoxious sexual behavior in defiance of specific requests that he cease. We believe his accusers.

Here at Freethoughtblogs, we are sex-positive, but we are also committed to the principle of consensual sexual behavior. We go further, and beyond demanding that there always be consent, we also insist on respect for your partners. No means no, not just because it's held as a dogmatic rule, but because it reflects a sincere appreciation of the autonomy of other people. We cannot tolerate violations of this essential principle.

While Dr Carrier has been a valued contributor to this network, we have to demand support of that principle in actions as well as words. After a review of the evidence so far, Richard Carrier's posting privileges have been suspended, pending further evaluation, and all comments on his blog have been closed.

If you wish to make a testimonial, pro or con, about Dr Carrier, you can send them to me in confidence. We will consider all the evidence before making a final decision on his case.

We also support Skepticon and their commitment to equality and justice. If you do too, donate.

Damion Reinhardt saysJune 16, 2016 at 12:13 pmAs a Bayesian, can you calculate the odds that at least three of the cishetero male social justice allies who have been published at FtB have been faslely accused of sexual impropriety with female students? I've read that such false accusations are exceedingly rare, thus making it reasonable to "listen and believe," as the kids say.

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Richard Carrier saysJune 16, 2016 at 1:32 pmPriors are reversed by strong countermanding likelihood ratios. So one has to look at the evidence to answer that question. And the evidence is available in every case here.

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Heina G saysJune 16, 2016 at 2:39 pmI wonder if you have any comments on this scholarly investigation into the matter?A BAYESIAN INVESTIGATION OF ALLEGED SEXUAL MISCONDUCTAbstract. June 15, 2016 Amy Frank made allegations of "sexually harass-ment" and "touching" against Dr. Richard Carrier, PhD at an event at ArizonaState University. In this work we examine the truth of these allegations usingthe only sound method for investigating historical claims, Bayes theorem. Weconclude the findings will have far-reaching consequences for legal thinking.The full document:https://www.docdroid.net/xyItgvz/index-copy.pdf.html

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Richard Carrier saysJune 16, 2016 at 2:51 pmYou aren't very good at defining hypotheses in your model. You confuse the actual thing that happened (which I agree happened and agreed I should not remain on the bureau for) and the thing she is now claiming happened. Which are not the same thing. The former has a probability of near 100%. Since I've actually stated it happened myself. It's the latter that's false. But your model doesn't test the latter. It only tests the former. Which is a rather useless exercise.